Complex adaptive systems: concepts and power industry applications

Research in complex adaptive systems (CAS) has begun to achieve an understanding of complexity in natural systems as a phenomenon that emerges from the interaction of multiple, simple, but adaptive, agents. The computer experiments, or simulations, used in this research have led to the development of mathematical and computational techniques that are equally applicable to the design of distributed control systems based on the model of a complex system composed of multiple, autonomous, intelligent agents, competing and cooperating in the context of the whole system's environment. The electric power grid, made up of many, geographically dispersed components, is itself a CAS that can exhibit global change almost instantaneously as a result of local actions. The new availability of very high voltage active control devices makes the grid a prime candidate to benefit from a distributed control system based on the CAS model. Such a control system for the grid may be not only useful, but necessary, in order to make feasible the current worldwide trend toward free competition in electric power, which, carried to its ultimate extreme, requires the substitution of coordination by individual agents in a free market for centralized control from a single command site. Using autonomous, adaptive agents to model and simulate the corporate entities, involved in this free competition, can also evolve new business strategies for internal reorganization, external partnerships, and market penetration.